How to Explain 2013’s Pop Culture Moments to Your Parents

Beyoncé

Beyonce was already a big deal. But Mrs. Jay-Z (you know, the rapper who wears suits) permanently staked herself as the game’s reigning pop star in the final moments of 2013 by releasing an album when nobody was expecting it. She could’ve released a single song out of nowhere and blew people’s minds; that she released 16 songs _and _videos was a nuclear test. And with it, she helped us remember how to be genuinely surprised.

The Wolf of Wall Street

That nice boy from Titanic? The one who’s sort of like this generation’s Peter O’Toole: handsome, rakish, the partying type, and sorely Oscar-deprived? He’s back, he’s on drugs, and he’s smiling a lot more than those movies you watched about a decade ago where all he did was scream into his phone. Martin Scorsese is back, too, and it looks like he stretched the coke paranoia scene from Goodfellas into three hours.

Catching Fire

Mainly a vehicle for Jennifer Lawrence, the first actress to simultaneously pull off the action star and awards darling thing since Angelina Jolie except this one is a lot more tolerable than Mr. & Mrs. Smith. It’s also a portrait of the hellish post-capitalist society you’ll be leaving to your grandkids. Thanks!

Kanye West

Kanye is our Lou Reed: a pissed off man in black who fights with the media and makes contradictory art about love and self-loathing that can both make people sob into their lover’s shoulder and also try to fight a cop. He’s engaged to the modern Marilyn Monroe if half the country _hated _Marilyn Monroe, and his daughter’s name, North, is a pun that everyone thought was a joke until they realized, “Shit, they’re serious.” Sometimes, he gets on stage to give long speeches (yes, sometimes they’re rants) about why Lenny Kravitz is a genius and why Nike should give him more money. But he also might be our generation’s greatest musician. It’s a great time to be paying attention.

Andrew Wiggins

The first new LeBron James since the last new LeBron James. (Who was…LeBron James, come to think of it.)

“Blurred Lines”

The handsome dad from _Growing Pains _has a handsome son who made a song about how he loves sex that is maybe sort of gross and weird and almost definitely a bald-faced plagiarism of Marvin Gaye’s “Got to Give It Up”. (He’s actually in the middle of a lawsuit with the Gaye estate over this transgression.) Despite having a number one single for what felt like half the year, his biggest moment came when he was used as a prop for...

Miley Cyrus

… the “Achy Breaky Heart” guy’s daughter, who decided her coming out party as a wild-hearted young would be at the MTV Music Video Awards, where she rubbed her ass on Robin Thicke and gave a performance that was at worst racist and at best just plain stupid. Remember when your kid suddenly started wearing unflattering clothes and talking about how the world just didn’t get it? Imagine that happening to someone with millions of dollars and a lifetime of privilege.

The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

Those long movies from last decade are back, and with most of the same characters. There’s Elf Guy, with his long blonde hair and the arrows; Wizard Guy, with the magic and the Shakespearean voice; even Short Guy, the uncle of the last Short Guy and basically the same, plucky adventuring type. And who could forget about Dwarf Guy? The most perfect three hours anyone could spend on Christmas Day mostly entertained and definitely sort of confused.

Bleeding Edge

The only book about 9/11 you’ll ever need to read and a way to make up for your failure to finish _Gravity’s Rainbow _in college. Pynchon’s pulled back on the overstuffed nature of his earlier work to become a writer who can have fun without making you feel stupid.

How to Explain 2013’s Pop Culture Moments to Your Parents

All that time you spent in 2013 soaking up pop culture hot takes on Twitter had to amount to something. Behold: The Christmas dinner table, where you’ll be able to amaze the entire family with how much you learned about our national zeitgeist. We’ve prepared a handful of family-friendly explanations for the year’s biggest stories, so that you’re able to explain without betraying just how many words you read about Miley Cyrus. (Jesus, it was a lot.)

Beyonce was already a big deal. But Mrs. Jay-Z (you know, the rapper who wears suits) permanently staked herself as the game’s reigning pop star in the final moments of 2013 by releasing an album when nobody was expecting it. She could’ve released a single song out of nowhere and blew people’s minds; that she released 16 songs _and _videos was a nuclear test. And with it, she helped us remember how to be genuinely surprised.